Piping a waste line to the interior of your house, to the sewer clean out?

MitchRyan912

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LifeTime Supporter
Jul 21, 2015
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Madison, WI
Just discovered we have a sewer clean out line in the interior of our house. Can we pipe up from this clean out line, with a tee of some sort for access down the road, such that we could run a pipe outside to connect to the waste line of our multiport valve? We are redoing ALL of our pool plumbing, so now would be an ideal time to do it.

This seems like a genius idea, in that the chlorine (if any) in the waste water would help kill tree roots that clog our main sewer line. On the contrary, a break in the plumbing from waste could lead to a ton of pool waste water in the basement. That could be really, really bad.

Otherwise, we'd just be sending the water out into the street and into the gutters, which may or may not be legal to do. Do the pros outweigh the cons?

EDIT: Picture of the area, with the clean out access in from of where the water line comes in:
IMG_4313.jpg
 
This is an issue where in some places you are required to discharge your water only to the sewer and in some places you are forbidden from doing so.

So first I would ask. then if allowed i would not block a clean out. Its probably required by code. And generally I would want to connect outside the house footprint
 
You also want to be careful with flow rates as well. People have occasionally had pool water discharge backup into shower drains and toilet bowls because their sewer lines could not handle the flow rate of water or were plugged up enough to be too restrictive.

The chlorine you flush down the sewer will do next to nothing to tree roots. Most plants and trees are fairly resistant to chlorine at concentrations found in pool water. You wouldn't even impact the bacteria growing the pipes all that much either.
 
In my area they require 0 FC and a list of other parameters discharge pool water to municipal waste systems. And like gwegan said the clean out is there to be a clean out not a place to tap into the system.
 
I was required by code to setup a P-trap into my main line that could be used to send the backwash from my DE filter. Turns out, pretty much everyone sets it up for final inspection then removes it because the flow from the pool pump would overload the system and push water out into the showers or toilets. I personally wait for a rainy day and backwash my pool right before that. I have a huge filter and very little debris, so I only need to backwash like 2 to 3 times per year.
 
+1 what others have said about the flow rate overloading a house drain system. But, that picture shows a natural gas meter and it looks like the regulator is attached to the larger black-iron pipe with the tee and "clean-out" plug at the top. Are you sure that is a house drain line, or am I missing something?
 
In my area they require 0 FC and a list of other parameters discharge pool water to municipal waste systems. And like gwegan said the clean out is there to be a clean out not a place to tap into the system.

we all know this is just silly because tap water has chlorine in it so ...
 
+1 what others have said about the flow rate overloading a house drain system. But, that picture shows a natural gas meter and it looks like the regulator is attached to the larger black-iron pipe with the tee and "clean-out" plug at the top. Are you sure that is a house drain line, or am I missing something?
You're seeing 3 things there. I had to tear down a wall to access this area, and discovered what that plug was that the former wall was covering up. I tore down the wall because the utility company is moving the gas meter outside in the next couple weeks. From the floor up is the water line to the water meter, and in front of that (flush with the floor) is the sewer clean out.

We recently had a plumber come in and snake out line from the stack pipe clean out plug, which he said wasn't as effective as getting the snake into the clean out that was blocked by the wall.
 
My only concern with this, would be as others said, the flow rate and the possible pressurization of a drain line that is not designed for water pressure, but to flow from gravity. I would make sure that the flow rate is low enough not to pressurize your sewer line. Reducing the size of your backwash line could achieve this, but might also create a separate problem of too much pressure on your waste line....
 

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Yes the FC limit is a lil silly but it's still code...

That aside if you are really worried about what to do. With your backwash you could dig yourself a drywell for the waste line. I'm sure there are code issues with that too.
 
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